We arrived at the Windhoek Railway Station at 10:30 in the morning. We disembarked the train, thanked the crew, and collected our luggage. After making sure we had everything with us, we looked around.
The station building itself was very quaint. It was built in the Cape Dutch style between 1897 and 1902 during the German colonial rule. An additional northern wing was constructed in 1929 to match the existing style of the building. If not for people around us in modern clothes, it would have been easy to imagine that we were back in the early 1900s and passengers in turn-of-the-century clothes were about to get off the incoming trains.
Since our flight out of Namibia was that evening, we did not bother to book a hotel room anymore. We had planned on spending the rest of the day exploring downtown Windhoek, then catching a taxi from any hotel at three o’clock that afternoon to take us to the airport.
However, we had a cartful of luggage to worry about. We did not want to drag it along the streets of Windhoek while sightseeing. Luckily, the train station had a luggage-storage service. We left our luggage there and then began our walking tour of the city.
We, of course, started at the train station. Within its premises are several objects and structures of historical significance.
The station houses the Trans-Namib Transport Museum, which has a small exhibition on the country’s transportation history with a focus on the railway. Inside the museum, one can find old railway equipment, railway maps, and documents dating back to the colonial times.
There is also a small section that features Namibian airways and maritime history, as well as the cultural aspects of travel, such as crockery and cutlery used in the dining cars of the South African Railways almost a century ago. One side is also dedicated to telecommunication and electrical equipment used for transport in the olden days.
Across from the entrance stands the German locomotive, Poor Ole Joe, one half of a South West African Zwillinge No. 154A, the sole surviving specimen of this type of steam locomotive. It was originally shipped to Swakopmund in 1899 and reassembled for the run to Windhoek.
We left the train station on foot and walked along Bahnhof Street until we reached Robert Mugade Avenue, one of the main streets of downtown Windhoek. It was quite ironic that Windhoek was our start and end point in Namibia, yet, we hardly saw it when we first arrived. With our limited time left, we resolved to see as much as we could.
It was like a typical capital city – modern, well-groomed, lined with government and business buildings, and characterized by busy streets with heavy traffic, as well as sidewalks populated by office workers, vendors, and tourists like us. Apart from a couple of church spires and one castle-like structure, we found the cityscape quite unremarkable. We were guessing that recently coming from the country’s desert, canyon, and coastal regions, where our senses were bombarded by rich sights, scents, sounds, and tastes, was a big factor in this seemingly anti-climactic visit to the capital.
We walked south and passed by The Turnhalle, The National Gallery of Namibia, and The National Museum of Namibia. The Turnhalle is a bright yellow hall built in 1909 and used for political conferences and summits related to Namibian independence. The National Gallery of Namibia houses a collection of art in a variety of media that represent Namibian culture. The National Museum of Namibia houses displays on Namibian natural history and ethnography, as well as it colonial and recent history. It’s too bad we had no time to go inside.
Further down, we reached a small roundabout where the famous Christuskirche (Christ Church) stands. This famous landmark is seen in almost every Windhoek postcard and has become something like an unofficial symbol of the city. This German Lutheran Church was constructed from local sandstone in 1907 and was designed using two conflicting architectural styles – Neo-Gothic and Art Nouveau – resulting in a somewhat gingerbread look. I was interested to see the inside of the church, but it was closed and we were told that tours are by appointment only. Or should their business office be open, one could talk to the staff and they’d let you borrow the key. Unfortunately, the office was also closed.
Across the street is Tintenpalast (German for “Ink Palace”) which is the seat of both chambers of the Parliament of Namibia – the National Council and the National Assembly. The name is an allusion to the large ink usage of the workers inside the building in the olden days. It has a Neo-Classical façade built with the use of regional materials. It is said that this building project used forced labour by the Nama and the Herero peoples, who had survived the genocide and were placed in concentration camps. The Tintenpalast is surrounded by the Parliament Gardens, which is a popular hangout for the locals.
On the other side of the roundabout, along Fidel Castro Street, is the Zoo Park, a small city green space with a pond, playground, and an obelisk memorial to German colonial history. Behind it is the German Embassy.
We noticed an outdoor market spread out along Independence Avenue, so we decided to check it out. Under rows of palm trees were craft stalls from rural communities and ethnic groups that sold all kinds of Namibian handicraft ranging from jewelry to carved tree roots.
We were drawn to the Himba women selling wooden carvings and beaded jewelry. I had seen Himba women in photos but this was the first time I was seeing them up close. The semi-nomadic Himba people live in Northern Namibia in the Kunene region and on the other side of the Kunene River in southern Angola.
Their women are known for their ochre faces and this distinction has drawn photographers to the country’s barren northwest region to capture their images. Their unique look is achieved by applying otjize, a paste composed of butter, fat, and red ochre to their skin and hair. This paste is sometimes scented with aromatic resin. Himba women apply this each morning.
From afar, they look like red people, painted with this paste all over and wearing only calf-skin short skirts with nothing on top. This look has been made an iconic image of Africa. The practice is said to protect the skin from the sun and also to repel insects. In addition, it is also for aesthetic purposes. And indeed, they look beautiful...even magical. I couldn’t help but take a couple of shots. I was too shy to ask them to pose with me for they were busy organizing their wares and I did not want to be so intrusive.
We found a line of souvenir stores along Independence Avenue, so we checked them out. It was starting to get so hot and the shade and air conditioning from the shops were a welcome respite.
One of the shops had a mannequin outside dressed in the traditional Herero garb – the Ohorokova. This dress is A-lined, with colourful and vibrant patterns and several petticoats. It is matched with a horizontal horned headdress called otjikaiva, which is a symbol of respect, to pay homage to the cows that have sustained the Herero people over the years. The Hereros are historically cattle breeders and they measure their wealth in cattle.
Inside the shop, I asked the shop owner why the Herero outfit seems to look a little bit Western in cut and style. She, being a Herero woman herself, told me that this dress has a long history. Before the Germans came, most Herero were bare breasted and wore front and back leather aprons made from animal skins. When the German wives of the missionaries and colonists arrived in the 1900s wearing their Victorian dresses, the local women adapted this look and they have held on to this piece of 19th-century history to showcase pride in their identity as well as to symbolize their troubled history. Like other Indigenous tribes, they suffered from genocide and this nearly wiped out the once prosperous people of Namibia. This dress is a continued protest against the Germans who butchered their ancestors - a kind of subversive fashion statement against their former rulers. Interesting!
To lighten the otherwise heavy and sensitive subject matter, I asked about the stuffed giraffe torso displayed in the centre of her shop. It was taller than me, and that’s only half a giraffe. She told me that it’s not fake. It’s the real thing. Poor giraffe!
We bought some postcards and magnets from her and thanked her profusely for sharing her people’s history. At that moment, I wished I had the chance to talk to Namibians from different tribes and learn about their history and traditions. Namibia is such a rich tapestry of cultures. There are around eleven ethnic groups in the country but each of these groups is actually a collection of smaller ethnic groups that share similar languages and customs.
With the heat outside starting to intensify, my husband and I agreed that it was time to call it a day. We would find an air-conditioned restaurant to have lunch, walk back to the rail station to retrieve our luggage, then hail a taxi from there. And since we had enough time, perhaps we could ask our cab driver to drive us around town and do a little tour before depositing us at the airport. That way, we could get the vibe of the whole city, for we had only seen a small portion that day.
We had our last “game meat lunch” and then proceeded as planned.
At the airport, we said goodbye to this far-away land that we originally knew nothing of, but that captured our hearts and interest in the two weeks that we spent there.
This trip was our first taste of Africa and it had left us wanting for more. There is so much to see and discover in this huge continent and all we had was but a glimpse of a small part of it.
In the succeeding years, my husband was able to go back. He attended business conferences in South Africa, Angola, Botswana, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. But that’s different. Someday, we’d like to go back and take our son with us to see and experience more of its wonders.
Photo Credits:
Gabriel Nashixwa (Wikipedia), ElviraHattingh1 (Wikipedia), Eignes Werk (Wikipedia), Georgio (Wikipedia), Harald Supfle (Wikipedia), travelnewsnamibia.com, deroas (Trip Advisor), justalittlefurther.com, airnamibia.com, yvmaps.com, theculturetrip.com, heybrian.com
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